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Monday, 18 July 2011

Let’s just say I work hard and plan for my future. (Yes, there are still some folk around naive enough to think like that.)

I go to work. I get paid … and I pay tax on every dollar I earn at the current rate of Envy Tax Income Tax.

I’ve got a few dollars left after the grey ones have finished goosing my pockets. So I save some and I spend some.

And I pay tax on every dollar I spend, at the current rate of Grab, Snatch and Take. And I pay tax on every dollar of interest I earn on the savings which have taken me so long to build up.

So far, so unfair.

Now let’s just say I’ve got a few dollars of capital left after the grey ones have taken their income tax, their GST , their withholding tax and whatever else those gorgeous bastards dream up. So let’s just say I keep building up that capital with my savings (which takes more time than it would if I didn’t have the grey ones in my pocket) and I eventually have enough capital to put towards starting a new business.

Naturally, the grey ones want a cut of every dollar of profit I make. And they put their hand in my till for ACC levies and for the PAYE on every dollar I pay my employees. So with the capital built up over many year, and the earnings I’ve got left after the grey ones have taken what they call their “fair share,” I navigate my way for many years through the govt’s rules, regulations and “guidelines”—and I do this for so many years I lose count, until eventually I decide to sell the business.

And then the Labour Fucking Party want to put their hand in my pocket again because, they say, I haven’t been taxed enough.

Libertarianz leader Dr Richard McGrath invites you to come on down to his surgery for an inoculation against this week’s stories and headlines on issues affecting our freedom.

This week: Who Pays The Tax?

Someone posted this to me recently, so I have to acknowledge the work of David Farrar in getting this information out first. However, Bill English’s comments merit further comment, which is why I reproduce much of what has been posted already on Farrar’s Kiwiblog.

Hon [sic] BILL ENGLISH: Our tax and transfer system is highly redistributive, and the number of people paying income tax is surprisingly small. The lowest-income 43 percent of households currently receive more in income support than they pay in income tax. The 1.3 million households with incomes under $110,000 a year collectively pay no net tax—that is, their total income support payments match their combined income tax. The top 10 percent of households contribute over 70 percent of income tax, net of transfers—over 70 percent of income tax, net of transfers. This system is highly redistributive and we believe it is fair. (My emphasis in bold).

So there you have it. On average you have to earn over $110,000 a year before you pay any net tax, even though you start paying net tax on income bands above $50k. That makes nearly 79 per cent of New Zealand households net welfare beneficiaries, supported by the other 21% and by the $380 million Bill English borrows every week.

So most of the country are moochers.

And the 10% of households who have visible earnings over $150k pay 70% of the tax collected.

Bill English admits this system is highly redistributive and he believes it to be “fair.” Fair? It’s outrageous. It’s so biased against success that it almost makes a person want to give up. Or emigrate. Or vote Libertarianz. Be advised: if you dare to work hard, or innovate, or invent; if you are an entrepreneur, if you succeed (or even if you fail) you will be punished!

Now be advised too that this is the system presently in place—even before David Cunliffe gets his hands on your wallet, your business and your art collection. Even under the system as administered by Sire Double Dipton, you will not be given an opportunity to employ others or to use your profits as capital investment. Instead, you will hand most of it over to the government as income tax, GST, ACC levies, consent fees, permit costs, etc.

Mr English believes that’s fair, because Mr English is in every way that matters an old-fashioned redistributive Marxist. Mr English is a man who believes in the maxim “From each according to his ability, to each according to his need.” (And as we know, Mr English and his family are very needy.)

That approach is fine when the community is a voluntary co-operative, where people can come and go of their own volition. That does not apply in New Zealand. We can’t opt out of paying tax, which of course is filtered through government departments before it reaches those to whom it is officially destined.

Greece… Ireland… Italy… Spain… Portugal… New Zealand. We live in interesting times.

And still 53% of people support that nice Mr Key and good old Bill English. No wonder Labour are faring so poorly in the polls. They and National are fighting over the same group of voters: those who want to live at the expense of everyone else.

There are only two political parties that want to abandon this self-destructive Marxian death cult. One is led by Don Brash, the other by me. Both our parties are “lunatic fringe” extremists. Both parties are “right wing”, and “racist”—or so the media would like you to believe.

Neither party appears likely to play any meaningful role in government of this country in the near future, for the simple reason (as a much wiser head than mine once opined) that there hasn’t been a revolution in people’s heads. And because 10% of the country are paying for the other 90%, and none of those turkeys will be voting for Thanksgiving any time soon. Frankly, things haven’t moved on since 1990; we’ve been in a time lock through the eras of Prime Minister Spud, Headmistress Shipley, the long decade of rule by Clarkistan, and what now looks to be six and possibly nine years of the Smiling Assassin and his sidekick Billy Bob.

Do New Zealanders really want to change? Or do they value the equal destitution of a collectivist state above the uncertainties of freedom and the accompanying obligation to think and act and experience consequences? Looks like that crab bucket mentality that tennis ace Chris Lewis wrote about all those years ago is still thriving. It’s so damned hard to shift people away from a mindset of utter denial about where our economy is headed. Perhaps the future is too scary to face.

And that’s the thing about the Libertarianz and ACT parties. They scare people, because people will do anything to evade reality.

See ya next week! Doc McGrath

UPDATE 1: Rob Salmond takes issue with the Farrar/English figures, saying the rich are not paying so much as they say—and then argues govt should get out there and soak the rich anyway. Read: Tax Burdens: Some Facts (For a Change).

Sunday, 17 July 2011

Anyone still muddled over the actual nature of altruism would do well to read the man who coined the term.

Here, August Comte makes it completely clear that when he talks about the duty to sacrifice self for the sake of others, he really means it. It's also clear, even from this brief passage, that it is incompatible with liberty.

“[The] social point of view . . . cannot tolerate the notion of rights, for such notion rests on individualism. We are born under a load of obligations of every kind, to our predecessors, to our successors, to our contemporaries.

After our birth these obligations increase or accumulate, for it is some time before we can return any service. . . . Any human right is therefore as absurd as [it is] immoral.

This [to live for others], the definitive formula of human morality, gives a direct sanction exclusively to our instincts of benevolence, the common source of happiness and duty. [Man must serve] humanity, whose we are entirely.”

Thursday, 14 July 2011

This week Bernard Darnton looks for a new house and discovers that Christchurch is a handyman's dream.

People think I’m mad to be looking for a house in Christchurch at the moment. But the entire property market’s just been thrown up in the air - literally - and it might be possible to grab a bargain from a “motivated vendor.”

We looked at a property that may meet that criterion over the weekend. It has large rooms, plenty of outside space, and fields either side. It’s zoned “Rural 5” and the barbeque area has a serene country outlook, populated by a few happy lambs.

Closer inspection of the District Plan reveals that “Rural 5” is whimsically nicknamed “Airport Influences”. If there’s one thing I like more than serenity it’s being on the final approach for lumbering military transports returning from Antarctica.

I reckon it’s a reminder of man’s ability to build lumbering military transports that return from Antarctica.

I have nothing but gobsmacked admiration for the extraordinary, distorted-reality world-view of real estate agents. I cannot imagine matching the incredible heights of optimism they reach, where it’s always sunny and the air’s a bit thin. One place we looked at fronted onto State Highway 1. When I expressed some concern about ever being able to get in or out of the driveway, the agent told me that the good news was that the road was being widened from two lanes to four, which would make access easier because I’d have more lanes to choose from. Apparently there has never been a better time to buy. In fact, we should buy every property we look at - right now. According to one agent, I absolutely have to buy a place in the next month because after that all the houses in the red zone are going to be demolished and the government is going to tip hundreds of millions of dollars into the property market. I’ll be competing with ten thousand other people for every sale.

Fortunately, I am also counter-assured by Christchurch’s silky-tongued mayor Bob Parker that there’s nothing to worry about because there are 20,000 sections around Christchurch ready to be built on. Well, almost 20,000. Almost ready. By “20,000” he means maybe up to 10,000. At a push. And by “almost ready” he means stuck in an endless loop of consents, notifications, objections, consultations, hearings, and reports.

Even where development is almost certain to occur there are still conditions to be met. And often those conditions are conditions the developers can’t meet because they’re waiting for - guess who - the council. The Prestons Road development can’t go ahead until a new sewer main is built - a council job. Part of Wigram Skies is waiting on the completion of the Western Interceptor (another sewer line) and the Southern Corridor (a road). These last two are at least under construction. Other developments are frozen in similar states.

Even when the critical infrastructure eventually comes into existence, the council forces developers to develop things that nobody wants. Zoning rules set a minimum density for new developments meaning that, for every 600 square metre section that somebody wants, developers also have to provide a 300 square metre section that’s much harder to sell. It’s deeply unfashionable for chickens to live too close together but allowing humans free range in the suburbs is a no-no.

The question of whether my house-buying plans are thwarted by displaced hordes from the Eastern suburbs probably comes down to two things. First: who has the slower bureaucracy? Central government, with it’s red zone payout? Or the city council, with its tortuous consents process? And second, will Roger Sutton, CEO of CERA, use his awesome powers to slash through Christchurch’s Gordian knot of red tape and open up new lands?

We know the demand is coming. Will there be any supply?

Read Bernard Darnton’s column every week here at NOT PC. Except when you can’t.

Wednesday, 13 July 2011

Regular readers will have noticed that I’ve been a bit distracted recently, the reason for which is mostly that I’ve been moving into a new office in Dominion Road (about which more in due course), and partly because local politics is presently so lack-lustre it’s barely worth commenting on.

But rather than disappoint both of you regulars by having just spartan offerings scattered across the blog, I’ve decided instead to seize the opportunity to post a few of the more provocative pieces from the earlier pages of Not PC andThe Free Radical magazine. So here, from the 1996 pages of what was then Lindsay Perigo’s Free Radical, is a classic by the curmudgeonly Bob Jones.

Stateless Standards

The debate following publication of my book Prosperity Denied* has exposed the real beliefs of those who support the Reserve Bank Act while purporting to be market adherents. What in fact they believe in is nothing more than private ownership. But ownership is meaningless if subject to controls and taxation.

As I explained in my book, true market believers recognise that all economic laws impede the market’s functioning** and ultimately result in the opposite outcome of that intended.

For example, let us imagine there were no health and hygiene laws applying to restaurants or no building standards***, and consider the possible outcome.

The socialist, with his inherent contempt for individuals capability of making their own judgements, would claim the outcome would be mass poisoning. Indeed, it goes without saying by inference, that anyone who supports the current regime of restaurant health standards has that view, otherwise he would not see the need for such regulations. But is he correct?

If there were no standards regime, undoubtedly and inevitably some customers would be poisoned and some even die.

But mindful of that possibility, people would simply not eat out—at least in theory.

Yet, as is evident, people do want to eat out—and it’s here the market would swing into play, filling the void of people’s desires.

What would eventuate would be Moody’s or Standard & Poors type rating organisations establishing their own hygiene codes****, which would probably be similar to the existing ones currently monitored by local government inspectors.

So why bother, you ask?

Well, the answer is the same as always when it comes to comparing the relative performance of private and public ownership.

A private standards setting and policing organisation, unlike the current public one, would be more efficient and therefore cheaper, and more effective.

The public health inspector will always be more lenient on offenders for a variety of reasons. Currently a non-compliant kitchen owner is issued a notice allowing him a period of time to correct the problem, but still allowing him to carry on business. A private entity could not afford that risk. Non-compliance would mean the immediate withdrawal of the rating certificate, perhaps in the form of a colourful sign displayed in the door just like credit card signs. If it wasn’t there then customers would shy away.

The net result: higher standards and lower policing costs, and also a fairer user-pay cost burden. The cost of the current inspector system falls on all rate payers. This way, the cost would be incurred by restaurant owners and be borne, albeit indirectly, by restaurant patrons.

A lax inspectorate would risk their entire business and additionally, given a poisoning occurrence, could open up the ratings entity to a damages action.

And what of restaurants not participating? I doubt if any would survive but should they, well, the customers accepted the risk with open eyes and any consequence would be their problem alone. The market economy is all about individuals making their own uninterfered-with decisions, weighing risks, and bearing the consequences of their judgements.

Frankly, I doubt any restaurants would survive if they didn’t buy a rating company’s services.

Exactly the same thing can be said about building standards, like restaurants, administered at great cost***** and generally inefficiently with only a marginal (and therefore unfair) user-pay aspect.

Who would buy a high-rise apartment, or even an ordinary bungalow, if it didn’t comply with an established ratings organisation’s standards?

Who would rent a factory, apartment or office if it didn’t have a compliance certificate?

The answer is: nobody.

Yet building controls and the permit and inspection system unnecessarily remain in public control, are notoriously inefficient and, in not being user-pays, are inequitable.

There’s a general belief that New Zealand enjoys a market economy, yet nothing could be further from the truth. On a scale of one to ten, we’re probably only on the second rung at best.

Currently, all that can be said about the New Zealand economy is that it’s a private ownership, private enterprise system, but a market economy it ain’t. Basically, it’s fascist, with its private ownership structure subject to a mass of directions, licensing and other control factors vested in central and local government.

* * * * *

* The book was a full-blooded attack on what was then Don Brash’s Reserve Bank, and the Reserve Bank Act that set it up (partly, it must be said, because as a developer-as-was Bob fancied a bit of inflation). A decade-and-a-half after publication, sitting midst the wreckage that the Reserve Bank’s meddling with the money supply created, you’d have to say Bob is at least partially vindicated.

** Especially those that set up a Banking Czar to dictate market rates!

**** That is to say, Moody’s or Standard & Poors type rating organisations without the sort of govt monopoly that Moody’s and Standard & Poors enjoy, and without which their incompetence in the financial crisis would have been duly punished by the market—if indeed they had not already been punished for manifest prior incompetence.

***** And, as the leaky homes fiasco proved, at great (and unnecessary) financial risk to ratepayers.

Monday, 11 July 2011

Libertarianz leader Dr Richard McGrath invites you to come on down to his surgery for an inoculation against this week’s stories and headlines on issues affecting our freedom.This week: A tale of two Ansells

NZ HERALD: “Act ad man quits after blasting 'apartheid'”: Former ACT marketing 'guru' John Ansell has been sent packing by Don Brash following his airing of outspoken views on pre- and post-European Maori and the government's attitude to Maori cultural values…

THE DOCTOR SAYS: John Ansell is perfectly entitled to hold opinions of any kind. Whether he should have shared these in his previous capacity as a representative of the ACT Party is a matter for ACT leader Don Brash to decide - which he did. Rightly.So, what does the Libertarianz Party think about Ansell's comments? Initially, Mr Ansell's name rang a bell, and a quick online search reminded me that one Colin Ansell (formerly King-Ansell) had been the leader at various times of the NZ version of Britain's National Front.

John Ansell has no connection to Colin Ansell beyond his name. But in perusing the websites of the haters while pursuing the bell-ringing, I noticed a few interesting things that strongly distinguish intelligent libertarians from the shaven-headed race-baiters. A perusal of the NZ National Front's policies, for instance, as outlined on Wikipedia, reveals just how different far-right parties are from the libertarian ethos of small government and maximum freedom:

There are a few area of commonality - the fascists want abolition of the Waitangi Treaty; Libertarianz would respect the Treaty as a historical but outdated document which should not be the basis for assigning rights and responsibilities. These should be based on a constitution that champions individual rights and does not allow for race-based legislation.

And they claim to want the abolition of institutionalised political correctness - as does Libertarianz - but I wonder if instead the fascists want to replace the current multicultural form of PC with their own white Anglo-Saxon nationalist version.

The fascists want a ban on foreign ownership and control of New Zealand assets. In this, they would of course have the support of Jane Kelsey, John Minto and the other CAFCA xenophobes. The Libertarianz Party believes in free trade and would welcome investment from overseas, just as it would push for New Zealanders to be able to invest in foreign markets.

The fascists want government to enforce the maintenance of Western Judeo-Christian morality and values; Libertarianz believes Government should not be endorsing any particular cultural values, and just as it would not promote "Westernisation" neither would it promote "Maorification."

The fascists are opposed to the immigration of people with non-Western values, and advocate the deportation of Asians, Africans and people from the Middle East (which would no doubt include Jews). Libertarianz would welcome the arrival of anyone willing to obey the laws of the land. In a society with a privatised welfare system, immigrants would not pose the sort of threat to the economy that currently exists when the newly arrived are corrupted by the availability of unconditional money obtained from other New Zealanders by force.

The fascists want an apartheid arrangement where "Maori" and "white" cultures enjoy separate governance. Impossible without a partitioning of races/cultures. The Libertarianz Party want the opposite - a blending together of all New Zealanders with mutual respect by all for the (individual) rights of others.

The fascists want State acquisition of the Reserve Bank - Libertarianz utterly oppose state ownership of any banks, believing in free banking independent of political interference. The Reserve Bank would be shut down by a Libertarianz government under which there would be no such entity as a central bank. Interest rates and money supply would be determined by allowing a free market in banking and by prosecuting counterfeiting of the type practiced by our Reserve Bank.

The fascists want a withdrawal from free trade agreements - in fact from all international trade! Yes,a fortress New Zealand, as favoured by Jim Anderton. A recipe for stagnation, poverty, starvation, famine and death.

The fascists want organic farming supported by state subsidies - the Greens would love them. Libertarianz would call a halt to political interference in the farming sector and in research and development. Organic farming would have to stand or fall on its own merits. There would be no favouritism toward any particular business model.

The fascists, in line with the Catholic church and conservative lobbyists, oppose women having control over their bodies and being able to procure safe, legal abortions. The Libertarianz Party believe a woman's body is her own and as such should have total ownership and control over everything within it.

The fascists, like the left wing of the Labour Party, Minto, Kelsey et al, want New Zealand to withdraw from ANZUS. Actually, that may not be a bad thing given President Obama's past links to communists and racists, and signs that Julia Gillard's premiership may be brief due to her abandonment of rational thought.

The fascists want to reintroduce capital punishment - the Libertarianz Party opposes capital punishment, believing that governments should not violate the individual rights of their citizens by killing them, instead enforcing restorative justice.

And of course the fascists want compulsory military training, as trumpeted by the Winston Peters Party. Lots of young people marching around in brown shorts carrying huge flags and saluting The Leader. Fortunately, because it opposes slavery of any sort, there would be no CMT under a Libertarianz government. The army would be small during peacetime and made up of volunteers.

I would wager the fascists would also advocate the prosecution of anyone self-medicating without Nanny's permission, just like National, Labour, the Greens, Maori Party, the Anderton and Peters Parties, Peter Dunne-Nothing and even ACT. They would probably want homosexuality recriminalised. Libertarianz believes the sovereign is individuals and thus that adults should be able to make decisions for themselves about such things as medication and sexual preference. The other parties don't trust New Zealanders and want to treat them like children. Only the Libertarianz Party believes in treating New Zealanders aged over 18 years as adults. Under a Libertarianz administration, the only activities that would be banned are those that cause harm to others. Anyone got a problem with that?

John Ansell did get two things dead right.

First, Prime Minister John Key is an incompetent economic manager - Bill English is still borrowing a billion dollars every three weeks.

Second, the National Party have abandoned - betrayed - their stated values. Key, English and most, if not all, of the National Party caucus are quislings, interested only in the retention of power at any price. Disgusting specimens of humanity, corrupted by the baubles of office. Why anyone would waste their vote on these cockroaches is beyond me.

The alternative to choking down the bile as one ticks the box next to your local National drone this November is to vote for a Libertarianz candidate. There is a candidate in Epsom who left Auckland ratepayers with a debt equal to what Bill English borrows every fortnight, and he may just find himself reminded of this as election day draws closer by someone from Libertarianz. Watch this space.

And, before anyone takes umbrage, I don't believe John Ansell is related in any way to the former leader of the far-right lunatic fringe National Front head cases. But what I found when I confirmed the lack of connection was interesting enough to comment.

Thursday, 7 July 2011

Tonight on this special impromptu episode of Perigo! Lindsay’s special guest is the admirable Roger Kerr. Executive Director of the Business Round Table, tireless and oft’ derided defender of free-market capitalism, Lindsay and Roger discuss life, the universe and Roger’s terminal illness.

Wednesday, 6 July 2011

In recent weeks he’s been talking up the problems created by the National Party’s Resource Management Act (RMA), and talking down the ability of people to do business on their own property because of it.

That’s not disappointing, by the way. That much at least is excellent.

So like ACT leaders of the past, he can talk a good game about the various iniquities of the ACT. Yet (just like ACT leaders of the past) when he comes to actually advocating anything is done to remove this piece of postmodern fascism, he turns into blancmange.

Instead of advocating removal, abolition—a stake through its heart—instead of any of these things it’s crying out for he talks about “reform.” Just like every other ACT leader has in the past.

What a pathetic, weak-kneed, misinformed disappointment.

When I challenged Don about this backsliding the reason he gave for this softcock soft soap was:

if Parliament were simply to "remove" the RMA I think you'd be left with the Town and Country Planning Act, which hardly seems to me to be an improvement. If the RMA were to be amended so that it was made abundantly clear that property owners should be free to do on their own property whatever they please, provided it does not jeopardise the property rights of others, that would be a major step forward.

This is very disappointing. Not to mention misguided and misinformed.

It would be like saying a rejection of Vladmir Putin would require the reincarnation of Leonid Brezhnev. Or (to put it in central banking terms) the overturning of the Central Bankers' "Great Moderation" would require the reintroduction of Arthur Burns' profligate 1970s inflation. Or to put it in terms teenagers might understand, like saying a rejection of Justin Bieber implies we must embrace Britney Spears.

This is, of course, nonsense. Nonsense on stilts. It’s nothing more than a bureaucrat's false alternative.
If that's all the advice Don is getting about replacements for the RMA, then I suggest he very quickly change his advisers.

It’s true that the virus of town planning came to NZ in the twenties, but it didn’t really begin attacking the economy’s internal organs until recently.

Introduced by the National Party, the RMA has now been with us for just eighteen years. The Town and Country Planning Act (TCPA)*, which was also introduced by National (are you seeing a pattern here?) had been with us for around two decades before that.

These are hardly historically significant time periods over which to measure the failure of these two acts to “balance” property rights and the environment.

Compare that with the signal success of Common Law over seven-hundred years to protect both. That Don and his advisers are apparently so blithely unaware of this history is worse than disappointing. For a party, and a leader, who purport to stand for strong property rights this is simply unforgivable.

The point anyway is not just to advocate AGAINST the RMA (and then to accept what you're given by the bureaucrats and your advisers as a replacement) but to advocate FOR property rights, and with that advocacy to promote the system with around 700 years of success in protecting both property rights and the environment, i.e., common law.

As ACT Party candidate Cactus Kate once pointed out, common law represents and protects the “Freedom to do what you want on your property as long as it doesn't impinge on others' right of peaceful enjoyment of their property.” So why wouldn't ACT Party leaders promote that? Your guess is as good as mine. They don't, but they should.

The return to common law would eject both the RMA and TCPA regimes, along with all the bureaucrats, consultants and other parasites and hangers-on that go with them, and represent a long overdue return to property rights and to sanity.

There are undoubtedly many ways to effect the change, but I'd suggest the simplest would be this:

while all this is taking place, have property titles amended with easements and covenants and so on to reflect the basic present District Plan provisions of height, density, and height-to-boundary (i.e., the very things in place when many property owners bought their present property, and on whose protection many of them rely) and make clear that property owners are now quite able to negotiate among themselves for mutual relaxation, restriction or furtherance of these covenants.

None of that is beyond the wit of man to either grasp or introduce—certainly not someone with the intelligence of The Don.

Set that up and then go from there.

And if anyone tells you it's "not practical," then point them to the nearly 700 years in which common law was successfully practiced.

We owe it to ourselves and our grandchildren to return to it.

_ _ _ __ _

* (And despite the protestations of planning parasites, these two acts in the way they’ve been applied are really just kissing cousins, since the RMA has essentially become the TCPA with more restrictions,less certainty, and a great deal more expense—and many, many more delays. Think of it as the postmodern TCPA—the TCPA plus kaitiakitanga.)

Phil Goff has pledged to deliver a Capital Gains Tax if elected in November,partly to fill the multi-billion dollar gap between his promises on spending and what he can steal from taxpayers,and partly to demonstrate to the world his abject ignorance of how the world works.

Goof reckons the tax will make housing affordable again--housing he reckons was made expensive by "speculators."

Phil, you are a moron.

Housing prices boomed under your party's watch because the Reserve Bank inflated the money supply by around ten percent per year, which spilled over into the housing market, and because planners used their powers under the
RMA to strangle land supply in NZ's cities.

And if he thinks a Capital Gains Tax would have stopped this -- if he thinks his new tax would somehow ha,he defied economic reality -- then I suggest he look at the experience of every Western country that had one, where in every place it did nothing of the sort.

Which is to say the tax would be wrong, immoral and iniquitous. So no wonder it's going to be flagship Labour policy this election.

Monday, 4 July 2011

Libertarianz leader Dr Richard McGrath invites you to come on down to his surgery for an inoculation against this week’s stories and headlines on issues affecting our freedom.This week:

NZ HERALD: “Swim star 'divorces' parents”- A 17 year old New Zealander wins a court battle to allow him independence from his parents so that he can compete under his own steam as a swimmer without his parents' permission…

THE DOCTOR SAYS: This sort of situation may become more common over time, as social norms evolve. With 18 year olds now having the vote and being considered adults, there will be 16 and 17 year olds who feel they are ready to take on the rights and responsibilities of adulthood, and who are entitled to take that case before a court equipped to hear it. (Equally, there is very little option left to parents when their offspring will not accept 'house rules' and declare they wish to charter their own course through life.) Of course, for the teenager this will mean having to finance all their living expenses and the cost of leisure activities, health maintenance and the like, and pay rent if they wish to remain living with their parents. It will mean teenagers having to do the time if they do the crime, or parents being expected to settle the bill for their children's misdemeanours - but not the taxpayer having to pick up the tab, as is too often the case now. In a society based around respect for individual rights, there would need to be a clear indication as to exactly when parents pass onto each of their children the rights they hold "in trust." Either this would happen at age 18, or earlier if the child decided they were ready to assume adult responsibilities. The Libertarianz Party supports the court's decision but hopes that in time the process of 'divorcing' ones parents could be streamlined and settled outside of the formal (and expensive) justice system through mediation and therefore with the consent of both parties.

THE DOCTOR SAYS: Fair enough comment, as far as it goes. Deborah points out that if you want to make sure that MPs rejected in electorate seats don't sneak back to the trough through the back door, then cross MMP and SM (supplementary member) off your list of options. Personally I like the sound of Single Transferable Vote, as you can vote for only those candidates you like, in order of preference. But the Libertarianz Party's preferred electoral system is any system you like—provided the activities of our elected “representatives” are strictly limited to the protection of individual rights. Ideally, New Zealand would be a constitutional republic, a 'New Freeland' as it were. Years ago, a handful of Libertarianz Party members wrote a suggested constitution for New Zealand that has stood the test of time. It is set on the bedrock of a principled defence of human rights, not the liquefaction of a 'living document' that can be interpreted to mean whatever the government of the day wants it to mean. Basically, the Libertarianz Party doesn't have an opinion on the system by which MPs are elected but what they are able to do once they have been. We want more freedom and less government, regardless of how our governments are elected.

Like most shrewd Democrats, one reason Obama,usually wipes the floors with Republicans is that he unashamedly defends his positions from a moral point of view.

In another biased editorial masquerading as a news report, the LA Times lays out this one gem:

"This is not just a numbers debate," Obama said Thursday in Philadelphia. "This is a values debate."

Would that the Republican leadership understood that – and had the courage to fight back the right way.

Instead of endlessly talking about jobs, haggling over deficit reduction numbers and the like, Republicans should be talking about what the Federal government should and should not be doing. Mostly the latter.
They'll only make substantial progress when they're willing to declare, as even the generally head-and-shoulders-above Rep. Ryan does not, an important moral truth: that Social Security and Medicare aren't just absurdly expensive, they're morally wrong.

No rational moral argument could justify taking from some citizens to support others, particularly at the Federal level. No taxpayer in Illinois has the moral obligation to support another in Idaho, no matter how much I might need it. Theft is considered wrong in almost every moral code adopted in the past 2,500 years.

While Progressives sometimes lose debates over economics, they've been winning the culture war for a long time, and will continue to win because of this very reason. Only if — and it's a very big if — Republicans will confidently come out in favor of self-reliance as a moral imperative, and in favor of charity as a marginal, personal matter, only then will the welfare state get significantly shrunk.

Friday, 1 July 2011

Oh the outrage! I’m so offended! What sort of term is that to call all those nice helpful folk at the council!

What sort of term is it? Answer: as a random trawl around the internet “reveals” (as if you didn’t know) it’s a very common one:

1957, "Three Ways," Time, 1 Apr.: Editorial writers were saying last week that Egypt's Nasser was getting too big for his boots. . . . The tabloid New York Daily News asked: "What has this little Hitler ever done to make himself noteworthy?"

2001, “"SI" Equals "System Imbecilic",” APS Physics website The new abomination is SI. Because the size of approved units progresses by thousands it is awkward for almost everybody. Democracy has been achieved. The Angstrom is verboten. One must use nanometers, which make molecular structures harder to think about. The Pascal (one apple-weight per desktop) is the approved unit of pressure, perfect in the eyes of the little Hitlers because it is unintuitive and unpopular. Here even scientists rebel. Many authors give pressures in atmospheres, thus using a familiar and enduring standard. Their papers will be understandable after the Pascal is forgotten-which it will be if scientists have any sense.

2002, “ Rooker attacks council planning 'Hitlers' ,“ The Guardian The new housing and planning minister, Lord Rooker, complained today about "little Hitlers" in council planning departments and urged them to be more supportive of new developments.

2005, “Unleashing the Little Hitlers,” No2ID website Carol Sarler, writing in The Observer, warns of the tide of petty bureaucracy that would follow in the wake of compulsory ID cards

2006, “The labyrinthine links of the 'Little Hitlers',” Website of the Families & Social Services Information Team (UK) “A significant number of (abusive) parents,” say the guidelines, “are likely to report having experienced genuine medical problems. They may or may not have been substantiated by medical investigations.” Come again? Their children may “present a rosy picture to the outside world”, “have been seriously ill” or have a medical history that started early in life. This is a charter for Little Hitler's and busybodies.

2008, “Now the Little Hitlers at the town hall are getting bigger and nastier,” Daily Mail Why is it - and this could concern you directly, since you may be helping one of their number either into or out of power on Thursday week - that so many of our local authorities these days are swinishly vindictive?.. Little Hitlers, we used to call them 60 years ago. Now they're getting bigger.

2009, “Little Hitlers,” Sunday Times Encouraged by Silvio Berlusconi, groups of far-right vigilantes are patrolling the streets of Italy…

2010, “Why aren’t the Conservatives doing better?,” Adam Smith Institute I also think that there is a rich vein of public sentiment to be exploited by railing against all the incremental infringements of our liberty that we have suffered over the last decade – promising to get rid of all the bureaucratic little Hitlers that make British lives a misery would surely be a vote winner. In 1951, Winston Churchill campaigned under the slogan "set the people free". If the Conservatives want to reverse their decline in the polls, they desperately need to capture that same sentiment.

2011,” Spoke too Soon,” Chrissie’s PlaceThe traditional image of the typical council manager as a micro-managing "Little Hitler" is well entrenched in British comedy, and that is because it is so often true.

2011, “Bureaucracy in America,” The EconomistThe common description of bureaucrats as “little Hitlers” (does anyone know who first used this phrase?) fails, or wilfully refuses, to recognise that we all have a little Hitler in us, or more to the point, that Hitler had a little human in him too, and that a human given power will exercise it, no matter how measly it may be.

2011, commenter at CiF Watch , CiF WatchI am afraid I really think that was overkill on Spielberg’s part [to “demand Megan Fox be fired from ‘Transformers’ for calling the (Jewish) director of the film, Michael Bay, a Nazi]. Saying ‘X is a jumped up little Hitler’ is part of common discourse. C. S. Lewis described his prep school as ‘Belsen’. OK, poor taste, maybe deserves a talking to and a slapped wrist with a public apology, perhaps, but not firing. This is unhelpful, I think, and totally unnecessary.

little Hitler (plurallittle Hitlers), Noun (derogatory) An unnecessarily or pretentiously dictatorial person - a jobsworth. A little Hitler is a self-important tosspot who thinks he's in charge. Someone who makes up arbitrary and/or self-serving rules and has a tantrum if they aren't obeyed. They tend to have a park-keeper/traffic-warden mentality; rules are Law and rules come first. They can't handle people who threaten their authority.

Looks like the perfect term to call these jumped-up sawdust Caesars who tread so heavily on other people’s dreams.

My only disappointment then is that instead of proposing to abolish the Resource Management Act, the RMA, the Act that gives these little Hitlers their power, he instead offers only to “reform” it. Frankly, after nearly two decades of evidence against the RMA and its abuse of property rights, that’s just pissweak. Even Nick Smith talks about “reform.” And he doesn’t mean it either.

Ayn Rand once observed that “When the productive have to ask permission from the unproductive in order to produce, then you may know your culture is doomed.” They do. And we are. And with the explicit approval of the chatterati.

Here’s Nick Lowe from his album Jesus of Cool:

Here’s Elvis Costello:

And here’s Everything But the Girl (undoubtedly the only time they’ll ever appear here, I promise!):

Since the country’s going insane over the so-called “death of free speech” because of folk boycotting an opportunistic book by a peddler of cherry-picking innuendo* (indeed, it was the cherry-picker himself who called the boycott the “death of free speech”) let’s examine again some basic propositions of free speech, just so we know what the animal looks like:

Some propositions on free speech

The right to free speech means the right to express one's ideas without danger of coercion, of physical suppression or of interference by the state. Censorship is interference by the state in the expression of ideas. (And laws against murder, rape, assault and child sex are sufficient to cover any violation of rights in the censor's current domain.) A private network refusing to publish your views or a bookshop deciding not to sell your pamphleted screed is not censorship - it is their choice. (Remember choice?) A private network choosing to offend is their business. Choosing not to watch or to withdraw advertising is yours. Bad ideas are still ideas. You should be just as free to air them as I should be to ignore them, or to pillory them, ore to refuse to give them a home. Just as the right to pursue happiness doesn't require that you be made happy, the principle of free speech doesn't demand that anyone provide you with a platform and a microphone. Just as the right to do what I like with my health and my life does not mean that I have to smoke cannabis, neither does the right to free speech mean I must offend. Just as I must take responsibility for what I do with my health and my life, so too must I take responsibility for what I say. I may choose to offend, and I have the right to, but free speech doesn't mean I have to. However, anyone able to épater le bourgeosie has always been able to count on free publicity from those being épater-ed. Drawing attention to something you dislike may give that which you dislike even more attention. Think about it. By itself, "I'm offended," is not an argument. It's just a whine. Saying you don't like 'South Park' is not a call for censorship. Saying you want it banned would be. Saying "I don't like that," is not censorship. Organising a voluntary boycott is not censorship. Organising a government ban however would be. I may be offended, but I may not commit violence against those who offend me. I may boycott, but I may not behead. Blocking traffic, threats, and forced entry are no part of the right to protest. They are respectively a traffic hazard, an initiation of force and an act of trespass. "Hate speech" is an illegitimate package deal. Laws against "hate speech" are illegitimate. Laws against conspiracy to commit murder are not. The right to free speech gives the smallest minority the absolute protection of the state to air their views. The smallest minority is the individual. My freedom ends where your nose begins. My free speech ends where your rights begin. The right to free speech does not mean that I may incorrectly besmirch your reputation by telling lies about you. This would be called fraud. Nor does it mean you may shout "fire" in a crowded theatre in which there is none, and in which the exit doors have been locked. This would be called fraud with menaces. Speech is speech, not violent destruction. Ridicule is better than bans. Moral persuasion is better than force. When tyranny occurs, it can be challenged from a thousand presses - but only if free speech and a free press has been valued in the interim; tyranny can never be easily challenged in the absence of the freedom to speak out. Free speech has been more valued in the abstract than in reality. "Freedom but..." is not freedom. Forcing ideas underground does not eradicate them, it incubates them. Bad ideas are anaerobic -- the oxygen of free inquiry kills them. Bad ideas can only be fought with better ones. If you don't like it, then just turn it off. Don't get an arm of the state to do it for you.

_ _ _ _ _ _ _

* No, there’s no more need to read this book than any other of the blowhard’s books. Like his Inwhishtigate magazine, they all follow the same pattern of carefully chosen facts, selected out of context and smothered in oodles of innuendo. Why would you read this one? You’ve read one, you’ve read them all.

Because while the whole country gets itself all in a lather about a non-ban on a boorish book, the government continues to pass laws, without opposition, that will impose an actual ban on economic activity around or anywhere near a sporting event.

I loved this quote by friend Daniel Bell on a Facebook thread discussing this:

It's quite silly really. The tournament is running at a loss, pretty much everyone has admitted this now, but the original reason the Government decided to do this was apparently because of the economic benefits it would provide, yet now they're passing laws saying you can't benefit economically from the Rugby World Cup.

We really are a pathetic authoritarian backwater.

In fact (with that first paragraph in mind) make that a pathetic and confused authoritarian backwater.

The internet has opened up a virtual cornucopia of art history to anyone with the curiosity to seek it out. But it’s still virtually impossible to convey the brilliance of Michelangelo Caravaggio by way of a picture on the internet—impossible because his method of layering his paint and leaving them partially transparent means that when seen in the original his figures look not so much like paintings as three-dimensional holographs.

This St Francis is just another electrifying figure from Caravaggio’s brush that translates very poorly to a blog post. But here it is, nonetheless, because my memory of it makes it one of the most memorable paintings of the nobility of man I’ve seen.

Wednesday, 29 June 2011

The current economic crisis has turned a lot of common wisdom about recessions on its head. Hence, I wanted to make a short list of these ideas. Despite the ideas' faults, many are still followed to the detriment of those who follow them. I know that I won't be able to list everything; so if you have some more points to add to the list, please send them over.

1. Hide from a recession in school - Unless one is getting a doctorate, this strategy has completely failed. Anyone entering a Master's degree in 2008 or 2009 should be done with the degree by now. Unfortunately, in the meantime, the employment situation has not improved. In some ways, the situation for the students could actually be worse than prior to acquiring the degree. These students are now unemployed with huge loans. If this recession continues into 2012 and 2013, even the PhDs will lose on this strategy.

2. Don't hire overqualified workers - This is pretty standard recession advice for companies. Sure, the overqualified person might be great for the job and a good deal for the moment, but as soon as the economy recovers, the employee will leave the company. And the company is left holding the bag without an employee in a more competitive job market. It's a bad deal. However, in this recession, the companies that hired overqualified workers scored big. The job market hasn't recovered at all. Furthermore, it takes unemployed workers about six months on average to find a job. If one hires an overqualified employee, they likely wouldn't be able to locate a better job searching part-time for a whole year or more. This has been a great time to get some amazing workers on the cheap.

3. Bet on the next boom - Many investors had a textbook version of a recession in their mind. There's a crash followed by yet another roaring boom. Sure, stocks recovered from their lows, but there's no raging boom taking place now. A bunch of folks are holding bank stocks ready for a leveraged play on the economy, but the banks are doing nothing but collecting dust. This view has kept many investors away from gold as they still believe in an oversimplified version of the business cycle. As soon as the economy recovers, supposedly gold should collapse. Well, where's that recovery?

4. Fiscal and monetary stimulus creates jobs - In my opinion, never has the United States government spent so much money and created so few jobs. The stimulus didn't even put a dent in the unemployment rate, and even the president has admitted that those shovel-ready jobs weren't so shovel-ready after all. Some have called this crisis the failure of capitalism, but with these sorts of results, big government abysmally failed even more so.

5. The effects of monetary policy are relatively quick - Admittedly, this took many free-market types by surprise. The Fed printed tons of money, and it has taken inflation nearly three years to show its ugly face. Many were expecting hyperinflation as early as 2008. Even the textbooks cited two years as the time frame for monetary policy to filter through to the economy. In this case, it's taking much longer.

6. Wait out the real estate market - This one is pretty self-explanatory. No, house prices don't always go higher, but many still hold on to this hope.

Well, that's it for my list. I know that I've missed some things; so be sure to send in your thoughts.

“Keynesian macroeconomics is literally playing with half a deck. It purports to be a study of the economic system as a whole, yet in ignoring productive expenditure it totally ignores most of the actual spending that takes place in the production of goods and services. It is an economics almost exclusively of consumer spending, not an economics of total spending in the production of goods and services.” - George Reisman

If GDP measurements were a good measure of economic health, then the US economy (and, by extension, the world economy) would be in fine fettle.

But who are we kidding? Bill English and Tim Geithner might think things are growing, but it’s not, and we aren’t.

The GDP figure is next to useless, unless you want to trumpet government’s good works.

The measurement of so-called Gross Domestic Product doesn’t measure production at all, it measures spending.

And it doesn’t even measure all the spending in an economy: Sure, it measures all the govt’s spending—every cent of it, all of which attracts the big tick from the statisticians—and it measures every cent ever spent on big screen TVs, small screen smartphones and Little Lucy’s little pony, but it only measures the tiniest fraction of business-to-business spending, i.e., the stuff that actually is the economy.

Nice ruse, wouldn’t you say, especially since it allows the govt to posture as a saviour when it uses its own extra spending to “top up” that fraction of business-to-business spending that’s dropped—spending that comes either by borrowing from investment markets, printing new money or taxing the hell out of business folk—al of which hinder rather than help production, and all just to help fake the figures for the next quarter.

So GDP doesn’t measure production at all, it measures spending. Mostly consumption spending. Spending that doesn’t last. Which means, when you think about it, that the more money there is in the system to spend (and after Quantitative Easing I and II, there’s an awful lot of it sloshing around the globe) the more you can pump up your GDP figures.

See how the smoke and mirrors work? See how you can be “not in recession” according to the figures, while all around you is a sea of losses, unemployment and general business-to-business misery. All you have to do is pump out new money, pump up your spending and WHAMMO! everybody’s happy!

Except they’re not. Reality can’t be so easily faked. Because as James Mill pointed out almost two-hundred years ago:

“The whole annual produce of every county is distributed into two great parts; that which is destined to be employed for the purpose of reproduction, and that which is destined to be consumed. That part which is destined to serve for reproduction, naturally, appears again next year, with its profit. This reproduction, with the profit, is naturally the whole produce of the country for that year.”

But this is not what is being measured by the GDP. Instead, this “seed corn” is stolen to pump up a fake figure.

We have not recovered from the Great Recession and thus our current economic stagnation is less a new event than a continuation of the original collapse. The basis for the so-called "recovery" was a rise in GDP, that measure of what we have spent in the economy. It's a fairly useless bit of data… Economic growth doesn't start with spending: it starts with saving and production and ends with spending. And that is why we should not rely on GDP to measure the health of the economy… So when the conventional wisdom says that the economy recovered in June 2009, it didn't.

Tuesday, 28 June 2011

In tonight’s seminar, The University Economics Group presents the film, “The Commanding Heights.” A sweeping political and economic history of the 20th century, it portrays the battle across the century between freedom and control--and how globalisation and free trade came out on top.

We will see the power of ideas, specifically economic ideas, and how they have transformed the world for both better and worse.

the government has begun a process whereby it will be nationalising virtually every damaged home in Christchurch—with taxpayers picking up the tab that should have been picked up by insurance companies

As Lindsay Perigo used to say, one of the maddening delusions of our time is the knee-jerk idea that changing our voting system is going to protect our freedom—far more important, we would say, to put our freedoms beyond the vote altogether.

Friday, 24 June 2011

Once again, while the world burns and economic fortunes tumble, the local politicians and their commentariat are more interested in a race-based by-election and a bloke who had the temerity to point outthe bleeding obvious. So let’s look at more important things, shall we?

There are two ways to tackle the mounting welfare crisis. Confront it head on, or lie about it. Which method do you think this govt (helped by an asinine media) have adopted? DPB - more going on than leaving – L I N D S A Y M I T C H E L L

Sections in a beleagured Christchuirch are still on the maret $200,000 when they should be around $50,000, if not for the absurd ring fenvcing of New Zealand’s most tragic city. Never has cheap land been so essential, and finally, after years for pressure, we have what High Pavletich calls “ a belated step in the right direction”: The “planners” have released one small part of the ring fence to allow around 5000 plots to be built on. Environment Canterbury looks to release land on Christchurch fringes for up to 5,000 homes; up to Environment Court– I N T E R E S T . C O . N Z

By the way, here’s something to ponder if you think little old NZ is going to continue weathering the world’s storms while racking up new debt at the rate of more than a billion dollars per month…

Here's a thought on the Greek/euro crisis brought to you by Austrian economic thinking. As you know, bond yields in the peripheral countries are spiking. Greek 10-year bonds are nearly 17 per cent, Irish and Portuguese 10-year yields are around 11.5 per cent. Conventional thinking says these high yields reflect concerns about default. While that's true, they also tell you something far more important. That is, there is very little real savings left in the banking systems of these economies. Rising market interest rates is an indication of scarce savings. Therefore, the price of money must rise to encourage saving and discourage consumption. When savings are plentiful, the price of money falls to encourage consumption and discourage saving. This process doesn't occur in a market distorted by central banks and currency unions. It only reasserts itself when the money fiddlers lose control, as they now have...- Greg Canavan, Daily Reckoning Australia

Human productivity allows mankind to escape the Malthusian population trap—and with freedom and a greater population, even greater productivity was possible. So why are the anti-industrialists against this? “Today, environmental groups call for a reduction in carbon on scales that would require a gigantic decline in our population numbers: we are told we must self-sacrifice and surrender our standard of living for the general good of a much lower population. The most extreme voices would send us spinning back to the dark ages and the more moderate would see us stagnating in development.” Why? Global Warming: The New Malthusian Scare – Toby Baxendale, C O B D E N C E N T R E

Just one example of how ingenuity and productivity combined open up whole new areas of the environment in which to live—making even greater population possible: the air conditioner. Hurray for Mr Carrier! The Heat Is On! – Mark Thornton, M I S E S D A I L Y

‎"It's almost as if Washington envisions the economy not as a complex network of billions of voluntary, mutually beneficial relationships, but as a lawn mower which could be forced to run smoothly if only they'd yank hard enough on the starter cord... ”Lawmakers should face the facts: Intervention is hurting, not helping, the economy." The One Stimulus Government Hasn't Tried – Jonathan Hoenig, S M A R T M O N E Y [Hat tip Keith W.]

Santiago CalatravA’s Chicago Spire was going to be one of the world's tallest buildIngs. But the financial downturn torpedoed its funding, and now it is all but dead. With other major projects on hold or cancelled, some critics say this is the end of North America's love affair with skyscrapers. Robert Bruegmann, of the University of Illinois, considers the fate of super-tall buildings in the US, and explains why he believes the spire may yet be built. And it’s a beautiful slideshow… Audio slideshow: Chicago's doomed spire – Robert Bruegmann, B B C

A poor interviewer takes on the world’s best apologist for his own mistakes, and fails. Watch the man who brought down the world explain over thirty minutes that it was all someone else’s fault, that he and his friends always knew what they were doing, that basically their shit doesn’t stink—helped by an interviewer who never knows how to ask the right question at the right time. Charlie Rose interviews Alan Greenspan – C H A R L I E R O S E

“Alan Greenspan has always cared about one — and only one — thing. Every nerve ending in his body at every moment in his life has been devoted to the promotion of Alan Greenspan.” Chairman Greenspan: A Fiat Mind for a Fiat Age- Fred Sheehan, M I S E S D A I L Y

More broken economic theory coming right up: The Phillips’ Curve is really just a load of old junk. The Phillips’ Jumble – C A F E H A Y E K

Wealth in a market economy is not a static quantity of stuff, never an inexhaustible fund that pays out goodies to lucky passive owners; wealth has constantly to be created and re-created; it’s never fixed. But the market “distributes” stuff unequally, you say? Baloney. The market is constantly redistributing wealth far more productively and fairly than any government efforts. Ludwig Lachmann on Income ‘Inequality’ - C A F E H A Y E K

Want a bigger slice of the pie? Then bake your own.

“When It Comes to Wealth Creation, There Is No Pie”

Don’t worryabout (former) All Black Stephen Donald. Stephen Donald is holed up at Peka Peka Beach. Just him, a penguin, and a werewolf. [Note: Parts of this may be satire.] Stephen Donald resting up on Kapiti Coast beach – S P O R T R E V I E W

Turns out you really can make a silk urse out of a sow’s ear. Can Do - F U T I L I T Y C L O S E T

In March 1974, Ayn Rand faced the improbable task of lecturing on the crucial importance of philosophy—to the graduating class of West Point. She succeeded magnificently: she attracted three times the expected attendance, she elicited an enthusiastic ovation, and her lecture was reprinted in a new philosophy textbook published by the U.S. Military Academy. Set aside a spare hour to relive this memorable occasion and insightful speech, and (re)discover the irresistible intellectual power of Ayn Rand. Philosophy: Who Needs It - A Y N R A N D

Parents, teachers, anyone interested in education … listen up! Here’s the ideal weekend workshop for you: a Montessori weekend in Matakana no less. What could be a better way to learn about the best philosophy in which to raise your children? A Montessori Workshop in NZ – A M O N T E S S O R I H O M E

Should the state waste time and resources tracking down “deadbeat dads”? Or recognise instead that just as there should be no involuntary servitude, there should be no involuntary parentitude (to coin a phrase). Video: Fatherhood Should Be Voluntary – N O O D L E F O O D

Here’s Paul Kelly’s tribute to a favourite place. You know, he’d give you all of Sydney Harbour, all that land and all that water, for that one sweet promenade.

Here’s Billy Strayhorn’s impressionistic masterpiece, inspired by the sight of London’s Chelsea Bridge through the fog, played by the masterful Ben Webster. [HT Jazz on the Tube]

And this, a few final moments from another of my current obsessions, takes up where Ben & Billy leave off.

Final moments of Bruckner’s 4th Symphony, with paintings by Caspar David Friedrich

Enjoy your weekend! PC

PS: Thanks to all those who deserve a hat tip, and my apologies for not remembering who was responsible for which link. My thanks, and my fault.